Review Flower Cosmetics

Alrighty, so I was not so subtly urged to check out Drew Berrymore’s cosmetic’s line by a fellow dance sister (Achem…Celeste.) She was excited about the products, and asked if I had heard about them or seen them yet. I hadn’t, but I did check out the press info she sent me and decided I might as well check out the line. I like Drew Berrymore after all.
Flower is carried exclusively at Wal-Mart, and is promoted as being a high end type of cosmetic for a low end price. It’s also cruelty free, and all the good stuff. All the colors are also named after flowers, or have pun-flower names.
You can check out the Flower line at flowerbeauty.com or walmart.com/flower.
My closest super center carries the line, and it did take me a bit of hunting to find the end cap with the products. I was sort of surprised, as I was expecting more of a permanent area in cosmetics. This leads me to believe it’s a trial run for Flower in Wal-Mart stores since they hadn’t bothered to rearrange their plan-o-grams for Drew.
I was also expecting more products. The press release didn’t go into the individual products, but the line as a whole. I got the impression there would be a full cosmetics line including face powders and shadows….I was wrong, or at least wrong for my local store. Which sort of made me bummed until I checked out walmart.com. Indeed, there is a full line of cosmetics from BB Creams to shadow quads. Most of the colors however are what I like to call “safe bets”. Browns and grey tones, nothing out there or crazy.

Mini Flower Haul

So I picked up the following products from my local super store…
2 Nail Lacquers, 1 Volumizing Mascara, and one Lip Butter.

First impressions before I started to explore….
I didn’t care for the Nail Lacquer bottles at first. They have those annoying square caps that never line back up right, so I was annoyed at this…until I realized you can actually remove the white cap with ease (it pops right off leaving a little plastic nubby) and line it back up with the bottle!! GOOD MOVE DREW!
I really liked the packaging for the lip butter at first. It’s cute and girly, and very eye catching.
The mascara packaging I don’t have strong feelings for either way. It’s green, and reminds me of a leaf. It’s neither difficult to use, or easy. Feels fairly generic in your hands, that’s not a bad thing.

So lets talk about the polishes first.

April Showers and Good Bud-dy

I tried the aqua color Good Bud-dy first. It goes on a bit streaky, and for sure you need to use two coats for fullish opaqueness. Even with two coats, it’s more of a jelly finish and you can see your nail line beneath the color. With how the polish went on, I was a little worried the quality and wear of the polish, even more so since I had spent 6.95 on it.
I was pleasantly surprised at the length of wear I got out of this! I tested the polish using a base coat of Sache Vite and no top coat. With just this combo, the manicure lasted a week! No real chips or flakes! I was shocked! How awesome is that?! Now, this isn’t so say the polish remained perfect. The tips did show some wear or “shrinkage” which isn’t noticeable unless you look up close, and most people aren’t checking out your nails that closely. Oddly enough, where it did start to chip was actually by the cuticle as the nail grew.

Quick color swatch.

I tested the dark dark blue April Showers next. I’ve mixed feelings about the color in general, I don’t hate it and I don’t love it…I’m in a neutral limbo. The color is one of those dark blues (A couple people have said they see green in it too.) that’s almost black. It has a unique finish on it’s own. It’s not matte, but it’s also not super shiny, and I dig that. I’ve been wearing this color for about five days now, and it’s holding up just as well as Good Bud-dy has! I even broke my tumb nail, and I assumed the polish would start chipping, it hasn’t! Not one bit.
Over all I’m very impressed with the quality of the polish. It’s worth the nearly 7 dollars I paid per polish. The length of wear is amazing, and I would for sure buy more in the future. The colors from the collection are over all nice, ranging from nudes to bold colors with lots of reds and pinks. If I didn’t already have most dupe colors in the collection, I’d jump on this line. The one thing I can say against the polishes is that they lack unique colors. Also, there’s no shimmers or glitter colors, so if that’s your thing…sorry! I should also mention removal of the polish is a breeze!

Princess and the Paeony

On to the Lip Service Lip Butter…I got the shade Princess and the Paeony LB4…mostly because the name was adorable. It’s a medium-warm pink-mauve shade with a silver sheen. It has a faint fragrance that reminds me of cosmetics I had in my youth. (It smells like the DiC released Sailor Moon lipstick and compact to be exact! Don’t hate…that pearly lip gloss was amazing!) It’s a very light rose scent with a note of vanilla to dull it down. Honestly, it could have done with out the fragrance but that’s just me. I’m one of those people that never sees the point to my face smelling like flowers. You can also taste the fragrance and it’s a bit off putting…much less so than Benefit Cosmetic’s Benetint. The fragrance tastes just like it smells.

Color Swatch

The wear on the lip butter is about average, there’s nothing that sticks out in greatness about it. The price point is the same as the polishes at just about seven dollars minus a few cents. It does condition the lips as well, so that’s a bonus.

Package Size vs. Actual Product.

Now here’s what I dislike greatly about the Lip Butters. Where as the packaging is super cute, I think it’s wasteful for a product that’s cruelty free and seems to be striding for planet goodness. You get very little product for the price. The package is bulky, and then the product is in this teeny little tube inside. It’s pretty damn wasteful and very deceiving I won’t be buying the lip butter again for that reason, good color pay off or not.
Colors are also pretty generic, but I was impressed with the number of pink shades, but unimpressed with the options of other colors.
On a final note about the lip butters, the top is pretty hard to get off, which is and isn’t a bad thing. It’s nice to know the top won’t come loose in your purse, but if you have trouble opening things you’re going to find this to be a pain.

Knockout Volumizing Mascara

Lastly, I picked up the Lash Knockout Volumizing Mascara in Black..which I got by accident. I had wanted the brown one as I am seriously lacking in brown mascara.

Mascara Color Swatch

The mascara smells like mascara, which was a relief. The formula is pretty generic, I didn’t notice anything super special about it upon application. It goes on easily and smoothly.
I noticed when it gets on your skin, it’s easily removed by gently brushing it away with your finger tips, and smears very little. This is a bonus. The Lash Knockout does what it claims, it does make your lashes thicker and longer, with a noticeable difference from your bare lashes. It also doesn’t clump your lashes together, so that’s pretty great too.
I didn’t notice any serious flaking through the day! So this is a serious bonus…I really hate when my mascara flakes.
Removal is easy, but please note…I didn’t purchase a waterproof mascara, so keep that in mind.
Prices for the Mascaras run about average or a bit below for most drug-store brands coming in at about 8 dollars.

So my final thoughts…
Over all the price is good for the product, except for the Lip Butters. I really wish there was more product to be had for your dollar.
Packaging is adorable.
The quality of the line is very good, I was super impressed with it.
I was floored by the quality of the nail polish! Worth every damn penny!
So, buy the polish, pass on the lip butter, and if you need a new mascara and are looking for a cruelty free product, this is a great option but only buy if you’re needing a new mascara…
But seriously…A+++ on the polishes! Did I mention that yet??

The polish is -awesome-. I just bought a 3rd color. I’m more into crazy colors and textures, so it’s a bit subdued for me and I have many a shade that are way too close. I’m hoping more shades are released.